The word "corporation", even in the legal sense includes things like towns. In a slightly broader sense, it includes things like provinces and countries. So why could it not include something like the community of people who live by and or use water from the river?

Now I can see all sorts of detailed problems with this (for example people upstream might have opposite interests from downstream, so the collective is not a coherent person-like entity). But I don't see a fundamental difference between this kind of corporation and that of the existing kinds.

Your suggestion is not problematic per se, but it's not the one advanced in the article. There are some very significant differences.

First, if it's the people who have the rights and not the river, than they can waive their rights as well. It's quite possible to imagine people who prefer development to a pristine river - this was the choice of every developing country after all.

Second, would the people have standing if the developments in question do not affect them or affect them positively? (e.g. diverting the river downstream, or drying up some swamps to halt some malaria-like disease).

The result is the giving communities those legal rights won't do for the purposes of those advancing this doctrine - many communities' political representatives will just waive the rights immediately, perhaps in exchange for some investment or another.

The purpose of this legal doctrine seems to be to stop developments even if the elected authorities agree to them, so they have to give the rights to something which can't waive them or trade them for something else.

Even if you could get one lawyer/rights group to agree a certain development is worth it, there would always be some other group ready to advance a claim in the "river's" name.

Both of these are perceptual choices you're making. In one case you've chosen to see the analogy as real. In the other case you're refusing to consider the analogy, and then casting your failure as some sort of universal ("nothing... allows"). But since other people clearly can see analogies, it's not universal; it's your preference leaking out.

I do not refuse to consider the analogy, after reading the article and all the comments here, i didn't find any logical ground for the analogy. Animistic religions believing that river has a spirit, or saying that river represents the group of people who live nearby (but who obviously have conflicting interesting) do not sound convincing to me. If you have any better arguments for the validity of the analogy, i'd be happy to hear them.

Analogies don't really have logical validity. They are a way of priming intuition. I agree it doesn't sound convincing to you; I'm just saying that isn't indicative of anything more than your reaction.

I am saying that any person who would use logic to analyze the proposed analogy and its consequences would see that it is absurd, independently from feelings and intuition. A normal reply to this would be a chain of arguments showing that in some case the analogy is giving a useful result.

Are you saying that logic is just "my reaction", and it is not any more valid than feelings?

I have already said I think it's an adequate analogy. Others clearly have too. Your belief that your personal thoughts are universal and infallible is your belief. It's not one I found persuasive at the beginning, and less so the more you insist on it.

You said that you think it is adequate, but you didn't say why you think that. I do not think that my personal, or anyone else's thoughts are universal or infallible, but i think it is possible to find common understanding using logic.

> It's not one I found persuasive at the beginning, and less so the more you insist on it

I didn't add anything to my initial argument to make it more persuasive, i merely asked you to tell your arguments in favor of the analogy, as i hoped you may have something more interesting to say than "your thoughts are your thoughts and my thoughts are mine" which is a tautological truth.